The Democratic Intensity Advantage

Jeff Alworth

There are many indications that there's a vast gulf of intensity in this election--everyone knows Dems are fired up and ready to go while the GOP is ... well, looking for the Geritol.  So evident is this reality that Republicans like Gordon Smith are trying their best to run on the Obama ticket.  Among popular adjectives in GOP ads, "Republican" ranks near the bottom.  You knew all this.  But yesterday, Pew released numbers on the intensity gap, and they were shocking. 

In what has now become a familiar finding, equal proportions of the party faithful support their party candidate--82% of GOP for McCain and 82% of Dems for Obama.  But that doesn't tell the the full picutre. In a series of questions they've asked during June in elections going back to '92, Pew measured the level of interest in related areas. And on these measures, Democrats are winning sometimes huge margins--and in every case the shift from 2004 is in the Democratic direction.  (Pew's numbers focus on the national races, but this GOP malaise must be regarded as very bad news for GOP candidates in state and federal races.)

Given quite a lot of thought to the election:

_________2004_______2008
GOP_______61%________72%
Dems______59%________77%
Variance__-2%________+5%

More interested than four years ago:

_________2004_______2008
GOP_______48%________51%
Dems______52%________71%
Variance__+4%_______+20%

Following election news closely:

_________2004_______2008
GOP_______34%________44%
Dems______33%________55%
Variance__-1%_______+11%

Satisfied with candidate:

_________2004_______2008
GOP_______75%________49%
Dems______63%________74%
Variance_-12%_______+25%

Really matters who wins:

_________2004_______2008
GOP_______72%________62%
Dems______67%________70%
Variance__-5%________+8%

Support candidate strongly:

_________2004_______2008
GOP_______73%________35%
Dems______58%________55%
Variance_-15%_______+20%

If you're one of those people who don't like to read tables, let me highlight one very serious finding: only 49 percent of Republicans--a minority--are "satisfied" or "very satisfied" with John McCain.

Issues
If the election were held right now, Obama would have a huge advantage, thanks to the current economic troubles.  The biggest concern by a country mile is the economy, which nearly half of respondents (44%) cited as the most important.These voters give Obama a 20% advantage on ability to handle the economy (51% to 31%).  McCain holds an even larger advantage on terrorism (55% to 31%), but only 3% of Americans consider this the main issue in the election.  Only three percent?--that's a rather remarkable finding, isn't it?  On Iraq, which 19% consider the central issue, McCain enjoys an 8-point advantage.

Other Findings
The report is absolutely packed with data, so stats geeks should check it out.  I will include a few of the findings I found intriguing, but I skipped over about three times as many that were almost as interesting.

• In 2004, 44% of voters thought Kerry was "too negative."  This year, only 19% think Obama is too negative. 
• Voter registration is flat for those over 50 years old; for those under thirty, it's up 5%, and for those 30-49, it's up 4%.
• In 2004, 72% of white evangelicals were satisfied with the candidates; in 2008, just 44% are.
• Over a third (38%) of Dem and GOP voters don't know the candidates' position on abortion.
• In June '00, Gore led Bush by 1% and won by .5%; in June '04, Bush led Kerry by 2% and won by 3%; this year, Obama leads McCain by 8%.
• Seven percent of Republicans think McCain is too old to be president.
• More people (35%) self-identify as independent than Republican (28%).
• Democrats are just as likely to believe Obama's a Muslim as Republicans (12%).

Fascinating stuff.  Go have a look.

By Jeff Alworth July 11, 2008